Very Long and Winding Road

Day 336
We were up early for a long ride to Luang Prabang. Nicole and I had decided to spring for a mini bus that would cut about 3 hours off the ride. We lucked out as it wasn't full and we each had our own row.

What we and not counted on was how winding and bumpy the road was. It twisted and turned to no end. Both of us were feeling pretty bad because of it. One of the other passengers was a man with his toddler daughter. She was sick, a lot. I felt really bad for her. The bumps were so bad that we were constantly thrown around on the seats.

During one of the side of the road bathroom stops Nicole and I asked some people if we could use their outhouse. There wasn't any water, but at least we got to pee in privacy. We stopped for lunch, but no one could eat. We all just took advantage of the upgraded bathroom situation.

Nicole and I paid the mini bus driver a bit more to take us right to our guest house of choice. Luckily they had a room with two beds in it. We quickly took showers and I dropped off my laundry before we headed out for lunch. We didn't go far and planned our next few days in Luang Prabang, the most historic city in Laos.

After lunch we tried to head to Wat That, but it closed. Instead we found an internet cafe, but the connection was so slow that I couldn't do any work on it and I left. Nicole got lucky and her computer worked a bit better. I spent some time reading in our room before she came back.

Around 9pm we headed out to the night market, but it was shutting down. We managed to get some dinner from one of the last stalls opened. It was just chicken and fish though. Afterwards we headed to a pretty relaxed place with a fire and a lot of people. It was in the process of closing, but they let us stay for one beer.

The only place opened after 11pm is the bowling alley. Nicole and I negotiated with a tuk-tuk driver and got in. Just as week were about to take off an Aussie jumped in, not even asking where we were going. He then turned to us and said "sabadee," or hello in Thai. Right away we knew that he wasn't the type of person we wanted to chat with. He then continued to brag about how in touch with local culture he was and that he had the best way to travel. We paid when we got out and he tried to bargain a different rate with the driver. The driver looked at us and we told him that the Aussie wasn't with us and went inside.

All of the lanes were full so we ended up just t chatting and drinking some beer before heading back to our guest house.